Stocks Dip Marginally As Cautious Investors Take Profit
Nigeria’s domestic bourse slipped as the benchmark index closed 0.01 percent higher to 63,757.23 points.
Gains in MTNN (+1.85%), GTCO (+0.87%), and NB (+4.47%) could not offset maximum losses (-10.00%) in Geregu Power, and other heavyweight stocks of Zenith Bank (-1.68%), and ACCESSCORP (-0.60%) keeping the market in the negative terrain.
Consequently, the year-to-date (YTD) return slipped to 24.40 percent while market capitalization shed ₦5.17 billion to close at ₦34.72 trillion.
Traders attributed the market dip to profit-taking by investors whom they said are being cautious.
“Investors are positioning in the expectation that shares valuation are going to go up after Naira devaluation. But they are also being cautious in order not to burn their fingers.
That’s why you see them taking profit every bit of the way. It is a normal market trend,” a senior stockbroker told our correspondent over the telephone.
According to him, equities investors have made appreciable returns on capital appreciation so far from the market, but they have remained optimistic that prices would further go up.
Trade turnover settled lower relative to the previous session, with the value of transactions down by 76.45 percent.
A total of 473.49 million shares valued at ₦10.08 billion were exchanged in 7,403 deals. JAPAULGOLD (-1.23%) led the volume chart with 77.98 million units traded while GEREGU (-10.00%) led the value chart in deals worth ₦4.86 billion.
GEREGU (-10.00%) led 21 others on the loser’s table while Honeywell Flourmill (+10.00%) led 17 gainers on the table.
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